“Those tweets don’t give an accurate picture of how well the Roadshow 70mm showings have gone,” Lomis said. “They represent issues that were rare and far between. And when those select occurrences happened, the projectionists immediately fixed the issue or switched to the DCP print, so moviegoers all still got to see Quentin’s incredible film. Part of the risk and thrill of 70mm and celluloid film is honoring its imperfections and the history it brings with it. The box office numbers speak for themselves to how well audiences are responding to this film.”

Here are some of the reactions on Twitter:

Hearing lots of stories of HATEFUL EIGHT projection problems. I wonder if this movie will sound the death knell for film over DCP.

They are misrepresenting the problem. At our local cinema, the print faltered on Sunday. We have had the standard print at every screening since. They are using the Thursday to Sunday data to cover the enormity of the problem.

Oh oh oh… It was the Police Union that sabotaged the 70mm projection NOT! How about QT fans ask Mr. Social Justice Warrior for YOUR MONEY BACK! He’s $ rich he can part with HIS money! Just like Obama! Obama’s in the 1% because he controls OUR MONEY supply like Congress! He could be broke, but it doesn’t matter he controls the whole country! That’s 1%, just like having access to secret bunkers etc. etc. It’s a breakaway civilization controlled by the Government & Shadow Government! I bet those Q-T fans sure H8 70MM ha ha!

I don’t understand why everyone is so harsh on film. Digital has problems every day. Consider this: in 2005, 98% of all screens in the country were FILM. The distributors told theaters “Hey so film is expensive and even though current digital technology is inferior, if you don’t switch, you won’t get our product anymore” So to the tune of $50,000+ per screen, nearly every screen in the country transitioned or closed if they couldn’t afford it. Now here in 2015, we’re at 99% digital or more. All theaters laid off their projectionists. They scrapped their ‘worthless’ film equipment. I mean you don’t need them anymore, right? When suddenly, BIG MOVIE COMING OUT EXCLUSIVELY IN 70mm!! We have 3 weeks to get an old refurbished projector/platter setup installed in 100 theaters at once, but can’t tell you which ones yet, oh and hey, find someone that can tune the equipment and run the film…. Oh, Star Wars is out on all the biggest screens? Whatever, just put it in the smaller screen down the hall. PS, it’s in an aspect ratio that less than one percent of the screens in the country are properly formatted and masked for so there’ll be cropping/bars on all other screens” Literally everyone should be amazed it’s going as well as it has because statistically it should have been much much worse. Most venues got their print and equipment set up only 2 days before opening day.

hateful eight was masterfully done….the cinematography, dialogue, acting, editing, story, setting, themes, homages….everything was awesome, and those mocking it clearly dont know about film and are just butthurt that QT can back up his own ego with amazing creative films that their weak feable dull minds could only dream of being capable of doing….the ppl that bash tarantino love boring ass over p.c. garbage like kings speech or something really respected yet boring and basic as hell…or maybe they like derivative movies like star wars that robs them blind of their money and they buy into it hook line and sinker….QT haters are never cinephiles and know nothing about film, which bothers them so much because they all know they are idiots and resent people lauding QT since they dont have the brain capacity and film knowledge to understand why his films and writing is awesome

this article baited people in google search results….i typed in ‘hateful eight box office’ and this article was in top tier area…why? on top of that, the headline on google only says “projection problems’ but once you go on site it clarifies that ‘projection problems rare and far between’…so its baiting, and misleading headline story…also the anti QT haters in this comments section know nothing about film, and are complete idiots

what a shame, having been dissapointed in quentin tarantino for many years ( i think kill bill , from dusk till dawn and his ‘death’ movies were all horrible, ) —————-it turns out the basic plot acting and dialogue of h8tful 8 make it his best movie since resovoir dogs and pulp fiction.

it was better than django in my opinion, but that’s because django focussed more on action and less on dialogue than h8ful 8.

i watched all of it and wasn’t bored for a second. it’s a superb acting and storyline, simple and good.
and its not over

Let’s see if Tarantino (doosh bag) will start blaming the cops for this! Boycott this film at all cost. Slime balls like this elitist clown don’t deserve protection from our police men and women. Let’s see if he can walk the streets of East LA at night and get home alive!

This is on the movie theaters. Young movie theater employees have absolutely no experience with handling and running an actual film on a projector as opposed to making keystrokes to show movies which exist only as 1s and 0s and are transmitted and projected digitally.

Projection woes are evident even in the best of digital presentations. Congratulations on keeping the essence of motion pictures alive. Forget the static. Go see Super Panavision 70 and THE H8TEFUL EIGHT.

Stop supporting all of this gratuitous violence in films. And you wonder why people have become desensitized to it and we have mass shootings. People like that weird, socially-maladjusted geek Tarantino are part of the problem. Stop glorifying him.

I’m a fan of his work. The problem is fanboys (like people comenting here) get the in-jokes. The people of Chicago and elsewhere ,for the most part, DO NOT. I almost gotten beaten up after Django because I was white. This movie is a vile call for a race war. Very ugly & hateful to be sure. Saw in in glorious 70mm at The Music Box but this movie just wasn’t worth it. It’s biggest sin? It’s BORING.

Not at all…by saying that the promos know you’ve seen the movies he’s directed, and proceed to list all the great films he’s blessed us with. Hateful Eight was a great Xmas Eve gift to myself. Oh, I saw it at AMC 20 with ZERO projection/sound issues.

I strongly encourage you all to see it in the intended format while you still can.

How many sharks does Quentin Tarantino get to jump before the public realizes that he is not the same creative genius that produced movies like True Romance, Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs. He has gone from medium budget unpredictable original and creative film productions to high-priced highly predictable film genre clichés

In Django Unchained, you were able to predict that one of the two leads was going to spontaneously sacrifice himself just to get the chance to kill the bad guy? Or that one of the most loathsome characters in a ‘black revenge film’ would himself be black?

And hey, even if you DID see all of this coming… you still watched the movies. Studio accounting doesn’t differentiate between earnest dollars and spiteful dollars (and there were plenty of those dollars coming in, as Django Unchained is Tarantino’s biggest commercial success to date).

I will agree that box office receipts demonstrate that many people disagree with the poster, but Oscars? Not hardly, they’re given by a bunch of Hollywood group-thinkers, and are given as often to support a PC cause as they are to actually good films.

Film is usually superior to digital projection, especially 70mm. It is highly unusual for film projectors to have problems unless the equipment is not maintained and the operators don’t know how to properly thread and focus the projectors. I saw Star Wars on digital and then found a theater that showed it on film. My friends had to admit to me that the film version had a much better, brighter, richer picture than the digital. So don’t blame film …blame the people that operate the projectors.

The trouble is that film theatres did away with professional & sklled unionized projectionists everywhere quite a while ago. Much like as America has gotten ridden of much of it’s skilled middle class labor force who had the temerity to expect decent salaries and minor safety protections as well.
They originally trained their managers to be projectionists as well…but, who then felt they were doing 2 jobs for one, so they would often delegate the projection work to candy people and ushers slipping them a few more minimum wage hours and a new spiffy title-tada-projecrionist. The exploited using the even more exploited.
Theatres truly get what they deserve now, even with digital making it far, far easier. Still, I see sudden show stops, house lights forgotten to be dimmed and out of focus or no sound shows quite often. Then you waste many minutes as they try to find the correct, sometimes sole, staff person equipped to fix the problem(s). And, I’m not talking about small mom & pop operations but large chain plexes in usually big areas. Greed, as it always does, will only continue to make matters worse.

This is sad. It is a bit like the kids that can’t write cursive, or do a math problem without a calculator. Only worse; art being pruned to a specific peg slot by cost cutting and mandatory simplicity. Lomis et al and audience- Do not let these theaters off the hook so easy, call out their ineptitude. Being only able to press a play button barely qualifies you to own a home theater. IMO, if you own a theater and do not have the ability to screen a film print, then you should be taken out back and beaten with a stick.

Not true. Many theatres–especially repertory houses–have maintained 70mm equipment, and often did festivals of such classics as LAWRENCE OF ARABIA, MAD MAD WORLD, VERTIGO and 2001. Moreover, occasionally films are still shot and exhibited in 70, such as THE MASTER, HAMLET and FAR AND AWAY. Hollywood stopped using Ultra Panavision in 1966, but continued to use Super Panavision, which is a non-anamorphic process.

Because its real. I dont know- maybe you are right. I read off of my kindle, but collect old books becasue I like the look, feel, and smell. Perhaps I am holding onto something that is not there any longer.

I watched it online last week and thought is was “OK”; (definitely nothing worth paying to see). It reminded me of a 3rd rate Spaghetti Western with past-their-prime actors. Maybe what is being perceived as problems in projection is just Tarantino’s way of completing the crappy Spaghetti Western movie effect; don’t bother seeing it in a theater as it will be available on Netflix or Crackle in a few months for those that don’t want to see it on one of the myriad of streaming sites that already have it.

Firstly, there is nothing wrong with the 700 prints as each of the 320 prints struck by the lab in Burbank CA was screened by the staff for imperfections. I saw a screening at the AMPAS in Beverly Hills several weeks ago and I found the titles to be out of focus so that may be what people are talking about. One problem is that you are training popcorn vendors to project real film instead of pushing a button and going back to the concession stand.

This trite, long-winded, violent Tarantino pean to outright misogyny (one woman bound throughout, no less) should be eschewed by everyone with even a minimal sense of decency. Aside from that, the movie is a cinematic black hole on its own dubious merits – that is, it purely sucks.

If you spent the money to go to a 70mm screening, you wouldn’t be happy if they switched over to digital! I was thinking of going, but in St. Louis, it’s almost $16 to see it in 70, and that’s at the matinee.

The movie was just okay. It’s pretty much a western period rehash of Reservoir Dogs with much more liberal use of the “N” word. Without Sam Jackson it would have been a complete failure. Sure would like to see Tarantino be a little more creative next time.

You nailed it, the gratuitous use of the word N*66#R by each white member of the cast every 30 seconds was completely awkward, weird, and unnecessary. To add insult to injury, QT kills every single black character in the movie and one of them by shooting his d*## off. Slow the heck down Tarantino.
It’s similar to Reservoir Dogs but far inferior. 2hours and 45minutes stuck in a cabin with racists southerners and a black guy with a fake letter from Lincoln…. talk about exciting…yawn…how does QT expect to get away with all this? Oh yeah by releasing it on out of focus 70mm, brilliant.

It’s not at all gratuitous for the period. The movie takes place shortly after the end of the Civil War. You clearly never read Huckleberry Finn, which makes Tarantino’s use seem positively tame. The word n***er is used over 200 times. That’s the way people talked.

jhs39 says:
December 29, 2015 at 12:08 am
” You clearly never read Huckleberry Finn, which makes Tarantino’s use seem positively tame. The word n***er is used over 200 times. That’s the way people talked.”

Did you cheer when the schools banned Huck Finn recently?

And no, that’s not how people talked back then. It’s how *some* people talked – just like today, some use that word. Go in any inner city and you’ll hear it a dozen times before lunch.

How do you feel about the word ‘Jap’? Ever count how many times that’s been used in fiction, in films, and is still used. Are the Japanese complaining? No. Neither are the Irish over ‘mick’ or Italians over ‘Wop’. It’s only the blacks or rather the white liberals who seem to care about its use. Most blacks use it, too.

Stop being such a apologetic liberal PC thought-policeman wannabe. Grow a pair and deal with it. Language is language. It’s use should never be banned or silenced because it upsets others. Try reading ‘1984’ or a little Bradbury or Huxley while you’re at it.